Comment by spamizbad 3 months ago
Interesting trend I've noticed: Tiktok's users tend to like its algorithm, and its probably the app's most valuable assets, but western tech executives tend to hate it and speak of it with derision.
This stands in stark contrast with US-based social media companies, where both its users and content creators often speak like they're at war with the algorithm, yet to the tech elite these sites algorithms are tuned to perfection.
It seems pretty simple. The Tiktok algorithm is designed to push content you want to see. In the US social media platforms are designed to push content they want you to see and everything you care about gets pushed out of the way. With US platforms you always have to scroll past garbage to get to anything you care about. Tiktok just relentlessly shoves what you want in your face over and over and over again, and when it does misstep it moves on to something else before you even have the chance to consider what you'd rather be doing with your time.
> In the US social media platforms are designed to push content they want you to see
Who is they?
Anyway, you're wrong. TikTok pushes videos you want to see, while US app algos push content you are most likely to engage with. These are not the same thing. In fact, content one most engages with is content that generates outrage. Try not to get angry when you open Twitter. It's not easy.
> Who is they?
Whoever runs the platform. That's the value they see in their platforms: the ability to control what you see, when you see it, and how you see it. You might only want to see what your friends and family have been up to, and in chronological order, but they are going to make sure you have to constantly scroll past shit you couldn't care less about to get to it, especially when that shit is advertising.
Not only do they do this for marketers, they actually think that making their users regularly disappointed and frustrated is a good thing. They think that forcing you to hunt for what you want makes finding it more rewarding and while you're scrolling past garbage/ads or searching for something you just saw, and cursing the obnoxious algorithm for hiding what you actually want they call it "engagement".
TikTok is also guilty of influencing what you see but they stay out of your way as much as possible. They bombard you with what you came for every minute you spend there. TikTok is massively popular and addictive because of that. US platforms could do that too, but their customers are advertisers - people who want nothing except to take your attention away from what you want to see.
You can go to twitter and get offended by bots, or you can go on TikTok and get bathed in dopamine. There's room enough on the internet for both experiences, but don't be surprised when people feel frustrated and annoyed by one of them and not the other.
Well yeah, you've got to stay angry at the right people at all times. As long as 49.9% of us are preoccupied with hating the other 49.9% of us, it's nice and cheap for the 0.02% to run the show. That's the social media value prop: division as a service.
> Anyway, you're wrong. TikTok pushes videos you want to see, while US app algos push content you are most likely to engage with.
No. US apps push creators, TikTok pushes content.
On TikTok, its the content that goes viral. Some nobody with 700 followers can have a video explode. That is exceedingly rare on YouTube. Its usually the channels with 1 million subscribers.
Advertisers love that, and so do platform owners. Its much easier to control and squeeze a few creators rather than a big diffuse group.
The Tik Tok algorithm is great. It feeds me compelling stuff instead of trying to piss me off like Facebook.
What you really said was “the algorithm I have been feeding data into for years performed batter than the one I used for an hour.” Shocking.
I didn't get an interesting video even with the search function. I just couldn't find compelling content on tiktok for my interests.
Also, 1 hour without an interesting video is something I've never experienced on YouTube, even on new accounts (I create an account for new TVs). I think I'm simply not their target audience.
I couldn't even understand the point of 10-20% of the videos, like "What is this video trying to show here? A random person saying the word banana in a loop"
People who use tiktok tell me it gets better when you have an account. All I know is whenever someone sends me a video it always tries to show the most emotionally charged stuff (e.g. war footage) right after. Now it's even showing pictures of Trump when you pause the video
i think they could if they started with "show users content they like" instead of "keep users staring at the app for as long as possible". both result in more engagement and more ad dollars, but optimizing for the latter becomes a race to the bottom with increasingly extreme, polarizing, emotion-inducing content.
the blatant algorithm manipulation around elections and politics is just the icing on the cake. sure, china is probably doing this too, but they're either being more subtle or playing a longer game. meta et al may have come out ahead for a few quarters but what's that worth if user count is declining long term?
It's pretty simple, the Tiktok algorithm recognizes the value of long term user satisfaction of it's users, and all the American Tech Algorithms are blind to anything long term, and plus the "user" is not the customer in the American tech product, the advertiser is, American social media is a product for the advertisers and not for the users. This is clear as day.
TikTok's algorithm is also nearly instant.
From time to time it will show you content adjacent to what you watch. After three or so viewings your feed will add the content you watched/engaged with regularly.
Press "not interested" twice (or sometimes once), and content will disappear.
American social media effectively ignores any input from users.
I don't use any of these services, but it's interesting seeing your comment and some of the replies.
Just this past week I met a friend who uses TikTok and he said the same: Really good algorithm. He said when he watches "intelligent" stuff in it, the recommendations tend to be as "intelligent" or even more so. Whereas his experience with Instagram was that it quickly starts suggesting brain dead content.
I have no issue with Tiktok remaining a platform in America, but as someone who has used tiktok all throughout high school until today as a senior in college, I think it is objectively bad to use this app. Some of my friends that also use tiktok can ONLY watch videos in 2x speed. They don't even have the attention span to watch a video at normal speed any more, which they proudly admit for some reason.
I also do think there is a little bit of passive censorship about controversial topics. For example, if you lookup "free tibet" or "free hong kong", the posts there have at most 2-5k likes, and it seems like these posts never really "hit" the algorithm's sweet spot and get famous. Sure, this is entirely anecdotal, but I do find it a bit odd how the algorithm chooses what to show and what to hide.
Once again as someone who uses it, I think tiktok and its algorithm are definitely crippling the youth of America. At the same time, it doesn't sound right to ban it.
The "western tech executive" is a propaganda mouth piece. This entire situation is reeks of political manipulation and dishonest voices from every single media pundit. Tiktok is merely a break in the wall to wall American Media Nonsense, and the proponents of the continual American Gaslight don't like a break in their manipulations.
I'd guess that it comes down to differences between the outcomes that either algorithm is trying to achieve. When westerners advertise they tend to provoke a sense of anxiety and then position the product such that it appears to relieve that anxiety. So we hate "the algorithm" because it's trying to make us uncomfortable without letting us leave. We should hate the algorithm.
I couldn't speak for Tiktok's aims, but they seem different enough that its algorithm doesn't chafe in the ways that we've come to expect.